On top of Success

Do not play with success! Once you begin to master something, win something, one will soon want to have more. And then even more, so much more. The trick is to take care of the success you have – to avoid taking on even more and finally too much.

Our start to the season has been rather unique. Two wins and two second places is pretty much more than one would expect in such an unpredictable sport that Rallycross is. We know the car is good enough and so is by far the team, but there are still so many unknown elements that have to come together to finish in the top two in the first four consecutive races.

Before the season, in early March, the whole team met to discuss the challenge ahead and the first four races of the coming season were devoted extra attention. Four races in four weeks requires a carefully thought out plan. There was certainly no room for mistakes either before, during or after the races, so naturally, our plan demanded the greatest degree of attention and accuracy:

* Avoid excessive damage to the RX car.

* All transfers, including the set-up and packing down, must be extremely effective.

* We must have clear back-up plans for all scenarios.

As it was said in the meeting: The first four races will form the basis for the entire rest of the season. It was clear to everyone in the team that we were facing four very demanding and arduous weeks after three months of hard work. Fortunately, I have a team that immediately understood what they had to do, and everyone was willing to do what was required – and then some!

After the four gruelling races in Portugal, Germany, Belgium and Great Britain, we were rewarded with 112 World RX points in total, 29 points more than our closest challenger.

It’s almost too good to be true.

All due to my unique team and sponsors. We have done it without any manufacturer support like our main competitors have!

Just before my victory at Lydden Hill (Great Britain), I faced a difficult choice. My team was given a very valuable invitation to the X Games in Austin, Texas and we had to quickly decide whether to attend.

Who does not dream of a gold medal in the X Games? I for sure wouldn’t mind…

But even if the will and desire to win was strong as it could be, our common sense won the struggle. The 2015 FIA World RX Championship has our full attention, it is something we have worked on for the last 200 days or so. Our resources are limited to 13 World Cup races,meaning it would have been a big risk to our World RX plan to do a race in the United States if something had happened to the car.

Instead, we kept to our plan with two very important test days in Höljes, Sweden. Those tests lay the foundation for the car’s capacity and performance for the rest of the World RX season.

Let there be no secret that I’m extremely satisfied with what came out of the last four weeks.

Now it’s time to focus on races in Germany and Sweden before all the equipment is to be sent to Canada. Three hectic weeks lay ahead of us before we can treat ourselves to a small summer vacation.

Preparations in recent weeks have been close to optimal. We are ready and are enormously looking forward to embarking on new adventures in the FIA World RX Championship.

One must work hard to achieve success. The whole team has worked long hours and late evenings. It remains to be seen if our priorities that led us to Höljes over Austin have been right.